Technology in Africa

Technology in Africa
2014 Digest
By Tefo Mohapi
Contributors: Varaidzo Mureriwa | Alan Knott-Craig | Calestous Juma | Ntobeko Wakaba | Meghan Semancik | Mark Clarke | Kanyi Maqubela | Mbugua Njihia | Johan Nel | Vika Mpisane | Amir Kiyaei | Jay Cousins
Copyright 2014 by Mohapi & Co. and Individual Contributors. All rights reserved.
No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other non-commercial uses.
For permission requests, write to the publisher at the address below. E-mail: TiADigest@mohapi.com Website: http://iafrikan.com Cover Image Credit: Derek Keats/ Flickr CC by 2.0
Table of Contents
Introduction STEM Education as a solution to Youth Unemployment in Africa Impact of the Internet in Africa Technology and the Reinvention of Education in Africa Build, Deploy and Thrive - Embrace the Hacker Within
Tech Startup Ecosystem and Investment Landscape Comparison

Technology Ecosystem in South Africa Free & Open Source Software - South Africas Missed Opportunity? The Rise of Peer Networks in the Innovation Ecosystem Innovation, Intellectual Property and Law
Content, What Content?

Single Internet Space for Africa ICTs Role in Strengthening Post-Conflict States - A Critical Review Reflection on Technology
A Publication of iafrikan.com
Introduction
I think the Internet is absolutely extraordinary. It's very, very useful and I think one of the things we've got to do is make sure that the African continent gets on to that information super highway. We've got to access this modern technology. I've been saying, for instance, if you put in this infrastructure, you're able then to deliver tele-medicine to a village. In reality, this technology is most useful for poor countries.
-- Thabo Mbeki, ex-President of South Africa in a Conversation with BBC News Online Users in 2000
Africa Rising is the phrase we have become used to and sometimes use carelessly in a bid to portray a progressive image of our continent despite some of its shortcomings. Although the past few decades have seen an increase in the fortunes of the continent, there are certain things that need to happen in order for Africa to Rise. One of the key factors that will play a role in the economic growth, skills growth and life improvement of Africa and Africans is Technology in the form of Information and Communications Technology. This years Technology in Africa Digest sees professionals and thought leaders in the technology industry offer their insights into the problems facing the continent and also offer solutions, some of which they are already working on. We hope you find this eBook useful.
Tefo Mohapi Publisher: Technology in Africa 2014 Digest
STEM Education as a solution to Youth Unemployment in Africa

VARAIDZO AUDREY MURERIWA

Instruction in youth is like engraving in stone.
-- Moroccan Proverb
The story of Africas booming economic growth has dominated the press for a while. Africa is the fastest growing continent economically, real income per person has increased by 10% over the last 10 years, and GDP is expected to grow by 6% per year. Amidst all this encouraging growth lurks a number of significant challenges that threaten to derail it.
Ticking Time Bomb Africa faces an unprecedented youth unemployment crisis. Having the youngest youth population in the world of 200 million aged between 15 and 24, increasing youth unemployment poses a significant threat to sustained economic growth and the growing political and socio-economic stability of the continent. South Africas Statistics SA released the official unemployment rates for the southern African country, which currently sit at 25.6% as per the third quarter of 2013. Unemployment is calculated based on active job seekers, thus when including those who have given up on searching, termed discouraged job seekers, the true unemployment figure for South Africa sits closer to 40%. According to Statistics SA, nearly 50% of the 40% who are unemployed, are between the ages of 14 25. Unfortunately, South Africa is not unique. Youth unemployment in North Africa sits at 30%, and this is even higher in some Sub Saharan African countries. Zambias finance minister, Alexander Chikwanda, states Youth unemployment is a ticking time bomb. Another Crisis
While youth unemployment is an often touted challenge for the continent, another, equally severe crisis is brewing.
The growing skills shortage, particularly in management and specialised skills such as in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics), has reached crisis level. Though an estimate suggests that there will be a 75% increase in the demand for expatriate skills in the next 3 years, one of the challenges of this skills shortage is that there is little quantification of the nature, depth and extent of the skills shortage across the continent and in individual countries.
Clearly the dichotomy of high youth unemployment and a growing skills shortage indicate a mismatch between the type of skills in demand and what can be supplied by the labour market.
Young Developers busy developing a racing car game at The P-Stem Foundation. - Johannesburg, South Africa
Demand vs. Supply
Based on current indicators, the growing economic resurgence in Africa is driving a demand for specialised skills.
These include skills in fields such as mining, manufacturing, engineering, retail, agriculture and medicine. Foreign direct investment and growing entrepreneurship opportunities in natural resources, retail and telecommunications across the continent require skilled geologists, technologists, engineers, technicians, and financiers.
Based on current indicators, the growing economic resurgence in Africa is driving a demand for specialised skills.
Compare this demand to the skills that Africa is churning out; the largest contingent of social sciences and humanities graduates of any region in the world with 70% of graduates in Sub Saharan Africa holding a social science or humanities degree, according to a study by OECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development)6 This study surmised that African universities are failing to prepare African youth for the labour market. It would be unjust however, to merely view this as a university or tertiary education challenge alone. Universities produce what the education pipeline fosters, and the education pipeline across Africa is leaky and has failed to keep up with the changing nature of the economy and work. Foundation The challenges start at a foundational level with the quality of foundational skills.
Foundational skills, are literacy and numeracy skills developed through primary and high school education. These basic skills allow for future training and skills development without which the attainment of adequate employment and or the participation in entrepreneurial activities is reduced. A lot has been written concerning the challenges of basic education across Africa, not least a curriculum that is still heavily colonially biased and does not reflect Africas current reality; infrastructure concerns; a shortage of of qualified teachers; and minimum on-going development of educators.
However, It is important to note that a significant portion of the "blame" for the lack of strong foundational skills is simply laid at the feet of governments and schools, and not enough focus is given on the other, equally prominent reasons such as societal attitudes to education, particularly STEM education and the role that communities need to play in supporting governments and schools in delivering education. To transform Africa's capacity to produce more qualified individuals particularly in STEM, African society needs to radically change its attitudes to STEM. In Africa, STEM is considered elitist, for the intelligent and above the capacity of the ordinary African scholar. This attitude is reinforced by teachers and schools that advocate for advanced maths and science for the top performers only, and a curriculum that provides a more watered down syllabus for the majority of students and learners. Compare this with South Korea, where advanced science and maths education are considered a staple for all students, and great performance in these subjects is attributed to hard work and not intelligence. South Korea, by the way, is amongst the best performing countries in education and particularly in maths and science education.
Communities, parents and business must also play a bigger role in education. The diverse nature of education and the curriculum today, and the challenges faced by many of our schools due to the legacies of colonisation and or apartheid clearly demonstrate that it does our children a great disservice, to limit education, particularly formal education, purely to the domain of schools. Parents and communities need to be actively involved, providing optional avenues of learning that substantiate the roles of schools. Research shows when communities, parents and schools work together to support learning, students perform better academically and stay in school longer. The single most important predictor of student success is the familys attitude that learning is a positive, joyful and valuable experience. Hence, parents, family and community are critical components of any effective education pipeline. For most of Africa, this presents a problem, as our historical background means that most students in formal education today are often the 1st generation in their families and communities to receive formal education. Thus parental and community involvement in education is limited. Organisations such as the South African Agency for Science and Technology Advancement (SAASTA) and the P-STEM foundation could be part of a resolving this challenge.
Research in the US shows that most science is learned outside of school in a variety of informal education programs, such as those offered by science centres, public libraries, community centres, aquariums or zoos. Expanding our communities capacity to provide out of school programs in maths and science, and promoting community involvement in these programs can go a long way in changing the perception that education, and particularly STEM education is purely the domain of governments and schools. Lastly, it will be important to include entrepreneurship into the standard school curriculum. This should include the technical skills of running a business, the softer aspects of managing change, dealing with failure and self-motivation with an intention to equip our youth with the skills to opt into starting and running businesses of their own. This will in the long run increase the number of job opportunities available overall and provide a rich pipeline of African based products and businesses solving local problems and challenges.
The solution therefore to the leaky education pipeline, requires a more integrated approach to education, involving government and schools, supported and substantiated by parents, communities and community based organisations. This will go a long way in alleviating the challenges of having a labour market that meets the demands of the economy. Ultimately, the skills shortage itself could work as a means of alleviating the youth unemployment crisis and provide a sustainable boost to economic growth.
Varaidzo Vari Mureriwa is an Executive Director at the PSTEM Foundation and a Technology Consulting Manager for Accenture South Africa. The P-STEM Foundation is a Not For Profit organisation promoting STEM education, careers and entrepreneurship for at risk youth in Sub Saharan Africa. She holds a Business Information Systems degree from Edith Cowan University, Australia and is an avid reader and traveller. Follow her on Twitter: @Vari_Audrey
Impact of the Internet in Africa

ALAN KNOTT-CRAIG

Water is colourless and tasteless but you can live on it longer than eating food.
-- African Proverb
Theres really no hope for you if you still need convincing that access to the Internet is a good thing. Ultimately the internet is an empowerment tool.
The Internet Advantage Its positive use can be experienced in fields such as education, employment, healthcare and generally as a stimulus to the economy. No longer are your opportunities limited to your postal code, unless that code is www, in which case youre plugged into the rest of the world.
With most people on the continent (Africa) not having access to free Internet, it means they are excluded from using the internet as an empowerment tool. They cant e-mail CVs for job applications, conduct research (e.g. on Wikipedia), self-diagnose health problems, or generally find out what is happening in the world.
So, instead of droning on about how awesome the Internet is, the question remains: how do we go about accelerating Internet access in Africa? Alternatively: how can we make the Internet free to all on the continent? Cost of Data
Traditionally, data networks (and as a consequence Internet access) have been the domain of fixed line telecommunications operators. In Africa, with a total of less than 10 million landlines, 3G (as provided by the mobile operators) has played the most important role in bringing the Internet to the people. As a result it can be said that the mobile operators have revolutionised the continent, bringing wealth and opportunity whichever country they operate in.
There is a problem though - 3G is expensive. Why? This is because 3G is a proprietary technology that requires huge capex (Capital Expenditure) and detailed planning, which in turn requires deep pockets and significant human resources. Once you add a mark-up and you have amongst the most expensive data costs on the planet.
City of Tshwane Resident speaking about the importance of the Internet (Project Isizwe Video) - City of Tshwane, South Africa
That is not necessarily a hindrance, the proprietary nature of 3G and the profits generated by mobile operators are the reason for the enormous advances in mobile technology over the past two decades. The problem though, is that the end product is not free, nor can it viably be subsidised to the point where it can be free. As a result of this, if we were to compare bandwidth to water, then you would be able to find Perrier in the farthest flung corners of Africa, but not a drop of clean tap water. This is ok if you have money, not ok if you have no money and are thirsty. How do we bring Tap Water to Africa? Two words: Government subsidies. This can be done In the same manner as municipalities use rate-payer revenues to provide basic water & electricity to all citizens. If we are to offer access to the Internet as a basic right, then a network will need to be built and paid for by the government.
Historically this approach has been wishful thinking. The aforementioned economics of 3G networks has meant the capex requirement and technical expertise needed to run a wireless data network were simply beyond the means of local government, especially on the continent. Things have changed in the past five years. Firstly, the explosion of smart phones means that over 50% of households now have access to a Wi-Fi enabled device. Secondly, the implosion of Motorola which in turn released teams of engineers who went on to form their own companies, freeing up decades of radio network expertise and experience. These start-ups have gone on to produce better equipment at cheaper prices than ever before, completely up-ending the economics of telecommunications network rollouts.
Whilst a 3G base station can cost up to a million South African Rands, the equivalent Wi-Fi access point now costs less than ZAR10,000 which makes it a hundred-fold difference.
Lastly, because Wi-Fi networks run on public access spectrum and focus on Web-specific content (rather than voice), the technical resources required are a fraction of those needed to operate a 3G network. The net result is that a municipality can now afford to provide citizens free Wi-Fi access. Its not as fast and reliable as 3G, but it is better than having no Internet access, and to a person standing at the bottom of the pyramid this is like an oasis in the desert.
Its not a question of if access to the Internet will be a basic human right one day. Its a question of when.
Also, Wi-Fi networks are becoming cheaper, faster and more reliable every year. So, without having to increase annual spending, the municipality can offer a better product every year.
Now thats what I call sustainable.

Its not a question of if access to the Internet will be a basic human right one day. Its a question of when. Africa has the opportunity to leapfrog the rest of the world, connecting its citizens to the Internet, and bringing water to a land that has had too much desert for too long.
Alan Knott-Craig is a Qualified Chartered Accountant (SA) and is the Founder of Project Isizwe, a non-profit organisation facilitating the roll-out of free Wi-Fi networks across Africa. He is also the founder & CEO of Ever Africa, a company that plays in the space of eCommerce, games, education and telecoms in Africa.
Previously, Alan was the CEO of Mxit, Africas biggest social network and also Founder World of Avatar, a leading investment house for mobile apps for Africa. Earlier in his career, from 2006 to 2009, he was CEO of iBurst and was driving the companys strategy towards building South Africas largest wireless broadband network.
He founded Cellfind in 2003, Africas first location based services provider. Between 2003 and 2013 Alan also co-founded and/or funded 17 companies in the TMT sector (Telecommunications, Media & Technology) in Africa, including Cellfind, Lucky Mobile, iFind34600, COLV, World of Avatar, Toodu, FSMS, Triloq, 6th Line, Daily Maverick, ARC Telecoms, Pondering Panda, MorMor Media, and Boom.fm. In April 2008 he published Dont Panic, a best-selling book aimed at persuading emigrant South Africans to return home. He was named as a Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum in 2009. 2012 saw him co-author Mobinomics, the story of Mxit, the biggest social network to come from Africa. Follow him on Twitter: @alanknottcraig
Technology and the Reinvention of Education in Africa

CALESTOUS JUMA

Education is the most powerful weapon you can use to change the world.
-- Nelson Mandela
One of the most highly touted developments of the last five years was the rise of the Massively Open Online Content (MOOCs).
This ubiquitous source of educational material promised to revolutionize education, mostly in industrialized countries. Massively Open Online Content The lure of open educational content was irresistible. Americas leading higher education institutions, led by Stanford University, took the plunge. Sending a new revolutionary trends emerge, Harvard University and MIT created edX, a joint effort to provide online courses. The edX consortium now includes 30 leading universities from around the world. Long before these giants stormed the science, entrepreneurial efforts such as the MIT-led OpenCourseWare (OCW) movement had set the stage for the coming disruption of the educational system. Institutions around the world grappled with how to adapt to the age of abundance, driven in part by the open source rebellion. These efforts tended to focus largely on revolutionizing education industrialized countries. More recently, the MOOC promise has come under scrutiny as early evidence of its impact started to emerge. The rate of completion of MOOC-based courses was surprising low and their pedagogic contributions became uncertain. The evaluations, however, have failed to distinguish between the dynamics of early euphoric adopters and long-trends in technological innovation. There is a possibility that the MOOC revolution will follow the pattern of mobile phone adoption, favoring poor countries with outdated educational infrastructure and technology. Earlier efforts by institutions such as the One Laptop per Child (OLPC) (on whose founding board I served) offer clues of the potential of MOOC for developing countries. OLPC, unlike traditional MOOC, focused on designing hardware that reflected the dynamics of learning.
School Children in Rwanda who are part of the One Laptop Per Child Project - Image Credit: OLPC
For OLPC, the availability of MOOC was not the driving force. Learning was the impetus of the design of a new laptop that facilitated interactive learning. The MOOC revolution in emerging nations will be less about access and more about learning. This brings us to the special characteristics of mobile communication in emerging nations, especially in Africa.
Mobile Revolution The rise of mobile communication has demonstrated the potential for technological leapfrogging. Economic pessimists could hardly see the potential for the continent to become a player in new technological revolutions. They recommended that Africa should instead tie their fate to older vintages of what was called appropriate technology in the 1970s. The phenomenal adoption of mobile phones and the reduction in use of landlines changed everything. Mobile phones defied all the predictions. The original assumption that new technologies were inherently more expensive, complex and inaccessible to the poor was proven false.
Promoters of this static view failed to appreciate the logic of exponential growth in technology, dropping of prices and entrepreneurial capabilities of local innovators. They could have hardly predicated that new global industries such as mobile money transfer and mobile banking could grow out of Africa.
Paving the Way To understand Africas future technological promise we have to look in the past. The continents analog revolution in recorded music is a classic example. It emerged in the late 1940s when the US was embroiled in controversies regarding recorded music. The American Federation of Musicians succeeded in calling for a recording ban in 1942 and 1948. Africa, on the other hand, leapfrogged and adopted recorded music and fostered an analog revolution that featured stars such as Le Grand Kalle, Dr. Nico, Franco, Tabu Ley, Oum Khalthoum, Miriam Makeba and Fela Kuti.
The men and women of the African analog revolution were also leaders in social commentary and entrepreneurs in their own right. Their vocalists were also poets. It was a period of remarkable creativity and genius.
The pressure to keep the cost of textbooks low forces many countries to settle for a set of standard textbooks that are widely used irrespective of the relevance of their content to diverse cultures.
Africas educational challenges are markedly different from those of the industrialized countries. Access to educational content is particularly acute because of the high cost of textbooks and the slow rate at which they get updated. The pressure to keep the cost of textbooks low forces many countries to settle for a set of standard textbooks that are widely used irrespective of the relevance of their content to diverse cultures.
Digital books have two important advantages. First, they allow for updating without having to go through costly reprints associated with hard copies. Second, digital books allow for more regular updating, which is essential in rapidly-changing fields such as the sciences.
Adaptation of textbooks to local conditions would make their content more appealing to students.. Children in fishing areas, for example, would not have be bemused by the relevance of cattle to their environments. Teachers would also feel more empowered and engaged when they can see themselves as producers of educational content. They can start with adapting existing content and graduate to being authors on new textbooks. This could also help to contribute to the decentralization of approvals for textbooks and give local governments more authority to determine educational content. The Future Africa can do for mobile education what it did for mobile communication. Who would have thought a decade ago that Kenya would be the midwife of mobile money transfer using a technology it did not invent? It took a small number of dedicated people in government and the private sector to turn a putative airtime transfer activity into a billion-industry. This was an act of creative courage that involved a direct challenge not only to the telephone industry but also to the banking sector. The same kind of valor will need to be deployed in education. When paper was introduced teachers worried considerably about its impact of the place of education in general and slates in particular. That was 200 years ago.
Today slates are back but they are digital.

The courage needed to transform Africas education systems will need to come from top leadership. African president and their advisors need to have the vision to see the promise of zero margin education. They must also be able to override the tendency of their ministries of education to stick with the past.
Several important measures will need to be put in place for Africa to benefit from the mobile education revolution.
First, it will need champions who can help rally public support behind basic requirements such as digital books.
Second, African presidents will need to invest political capital in mobile education. This will take focused efforts by heads of state and government to promote mobile education. They have to champion it and bring the full might of the state of educational transformation. Measures such as national service for the mentally-able will be an important part of the transformation of education in emerging nations. Third, Africa will need to introduce a certain measure of flexibility in its educational systems to allow for more experimentation in curriculum development and pedagogy. The transition from slates to notebook changed educational systems. Emerging educational technologies will change education in even more fundamental ways. The benefits will accrue to the try out new approaches rather than those who stick with the past. Finally, the rapid rate at which technology is changing demands that leaders get the best available advice. These advances are not only in the technological space but also in the fields of brain science and learning. They challenge traditional views about how humans learn and offer new insights on how to upgrade our learning capabilities. Little will be gained until leaders take charge of the process of harnessing the power of mobile education. Failure to do so will leave Africa at a standstill. There is no better time for champions of mobile education in Africa than now.
Calestous Juma is an internationally recognized authority on the role of science, technology, engineering and innovation in sustainable development. He is Professor of the Practice of International Development and Director of the Science, Technology, and Globalization Project at Harvard Kennedy School. He is also the Faculty Chair for Innovation for Economic Development Executive Program and directs the Schools Agricultural Innovation Policy in Africa Project funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Juma has been elected to several scientific and engineering academies including the Royal Society of London, the US National Academy of Sciences, the World Academy of Sciences (TWAS), the UK Royal Academy of Engineering and the African Academy of Sciences. He co-chairs the African Unions High-Level Panel on Science, Technology and Innovation and is on the board of the Aga Khan University. His previous positions include: founding Executive Director of the African Centre for Technology Studies in Nairobi; Executive Secretary of the UN Convention on Biological Diversity; Chancellor of the University of Guyana; and judging panel member of the Queen Elizabeth Prize for Engineering. Juma holds a DPhil in science and technology policy studies from the University of Sussex (UK) and has received numerous international awards and honorary degrees for his work on sustainable development. His latest book, The New Harvest: Agricultural Innovation in Africa, was published in 2011 by Oxford University Press. He is currently completing two books: How Economies Succeed: Science, Technology, Engineering and Prosperity and Innovation and its Enemies: Resistance to New Technologies. Follow him on Twitter: @Calestous
Build, Deploy and Thrive Embrace the Hacker Within

NTOBEKO WAKABA

Several repeated visits to the mud pit enable the wasp to build its house.
-- Ghanaian Proverb
Growing up in the 1980s in Soweto, South Africa was an interesting experience. I have fond memories of that period (minus the unglamorous political unrest of course).
As kids, we had a lot to keep us busy. As with most neighbourhoods in Soweto, ours was one where everyone knew each other. The Builders We were a diverse bunch of kids, but if I could roughly slot us into two groups: there were builders and there were wreckers.
Nothing is ever that simple, but there were those kids who were energised by building stuff and having fun around that. Stuff that the builders would build was not necessarily tangible, like organising a BMX race, or putting together a soccer team. There were also builders who would actually make stuff. I consider myself a builder in that period and I literally got involved in bricklaying!
Wreckers on the other hand were the bullies, aspirant thugs, and generally mean-spirited kids who loved nothing but destruction; fortunately there werent too many of those. We, generally speaking, didnt have fancy toys. So, most of what we played with was generally hand made. Our creations included Kettis (slingshots), kites, go-carts, and my favourite: wire cars. The skill level in making all these different toys varied considerably. The material needed to make a good looking and reasonably sturdy wire car included stiff wire (obtained from your parents wardrobe), soft wire (hard to get, and usually obtained through barter with your friends), and wheels (made from tin cans, polish tins, or plastic snuff containers). If you had the ability to make a really good-looking car, you could trade with your friends and get all kinds of cool stuff (like a karate book to improve your flying kick technique Mae Tobi Geri). So very early on, my friends and I were in the habit of building stuff.
Little girl playing with a wire car. - Image Credit: Wildebeast1 / Flickr CC by 2.0
The pattern was to find out what was cool, learn how to build it, sit in a quiet space building, and then show off your creation to your friends. In return for your efforts, youd get praise, respect, and a possible opportunity to trade. This is the culture Id like to talk about a little more in this article. The neighbourhood I grew up in and my childhood friends, was a microcosm of something that exists today: the technology ecosystem in South Africa.
I see aspects of the technology ecosystem that map very neatly to attributes of the builders (read hackers) Ive described above. But before we talk about parallels between builders of the 1980s and the technology ecosystem today, lets first talk about how we got here: what made us choose building software as a career and how did we get here?
Education
To clear up any potential confusion, lets revisit the term hacker. Paul Graham (2004) wrote in his essay The Word Hacker:
To the popular press, hacker means someone who breaks into computers. Among programmers it means a good programmer someone who can make a computer do what he wants whether the computer wants to or not. Therefore, when I talk about hackers, Im referring to the programmers definition of the word.
Many professional programmers today learned how to program when they were kids. In addition to building go-carts and wire cars, they may have been hacking on Commodore 64s, coding sprites that almost resembled games. A programmer who was lucky enough to have coded growing up was usually very clear on their career choices.
Other programmers may have stumbled into the craft (maybe at tertiary level). For programmers who wrote their first line of code at tertiary level (and loved it), its likely that they were the builders I was talking about earlier on. Regardless of how one got started with programming, for those who loved it, it was a new found way to express one's creativity and ingenuity.
As a hacker, what you want to do is be in a situation where you find flow; by this, I mean you want to be working in a groove that fits your personality and strengths.
For those studying computing at tertiary, it would be possible to choose a track that best suited your interests; you could specialise in tracks such as business information systems, scientific computing, computer engineering, geographic information systems, and many more. By choosing the right track, you would be setting yourself up for a career building stuff you liked. So after a good number of years studying computing, one heads into the marketplace to find a job. The typical criteria in evaluating career prospects are roughly as follows: 1. Get the highest possible starting salary. 2. What can I expect to be earning in 1 years time? 3. Work in a financial hub (salaries are higher there). Id like to pause and pose a question at this point: is the inner hacker beginning to malfunction? As a true hacker, Im pretty sure youd expect the criteria to be as follows: 1. 2. 3. 4. What kind of software does the company build? Will I be involved in serious development? Who will I be working with? Is this a hacker friendly environment?
This is what a real programmer would be asking; right? I think the initial criteria are influenced by a number of factors that are endemic to South Africa (and likely other parts of the developing world).
Classes in the South African population - Image Credit: Visagie 2013
The problem we have in South Africa is that way too many people live in poverty. The result of this is that many people look to take care of their basic needs at the earliest possible opportunity. From the figure above, one can see that as recently as 2008, less than 25% of our population was in the middle class or above. The class definitions in the figure are indicative of per capita monthly household income levels. A terse look at these numbers shows that the vast majority of South Africans are still grappling with basic needs. I havent looked at similar statistics for computing students, but Id expect one to find a similar trend. In light of these numbers, the second set of hacker criteria I listed above begin to look more like needs on a self actualisation level; the need to be part of something big, where you can make a dent on the world. With these kinds of dynamics at play, what kind of a career do computing professionals lead? Career Lets start with the hacker who lands a job by applying the first set of criteria. For this programmer, the ideal scenario is to get a job where theres no bursary payback and the maximum amount of money can be made. This programmer is likely to have a lot of personal responsibility upfront and a lot of money will come in handy. The company she works for will most likely be of the corporate or large consulting variety, where bright young minds are usually snapped up. Shell join the firm and relish every moment she gets to apply the knowledge that she obtained during her studies. As she gains more experience, shell begin to understand corporate culture and how to move up the ladder (making more money in the process). Our young hacker navigates this complex world and resists the urge to take short cuts and become a wrecker. At some point, shell realise that she hasnt written one line of code for months and will be proud of this. To be clear, this is the hacker who used to build software from scratch and gold plate it with extra features to get the bonus points. This is not the student who used to say stuff like: I love computer science, its just the programming part I cant stand. So what happened here? My observation is that our young hacker followed the money instead of her passion and in the process lost a lot of that hacker spirit. This outcome of course was influenced by her situation in the first place. Now we turn our attention to the second hacker who applies the second set of self-actualising criteria to look for a job. Money is not a major influencing factor in landing a job. Our young hacker comes from an upper middle class background; his main concern is the software that hes building and how hell be able to make something that people need and really want to use. Hes likely working for a local software vendor or a start-up. Our young hacker benefits a great deal from the accelerated learning experience afforded to him by the smaller, more intimate working environment. During the normal course of his work, he may make contributions to some related open source projects. As time progresses, his geek cred grows by leaps and bounds; this work is fuelling his passion in a big way. Hes not driving the slick and luxurious German sedan, but who cares hes building killer products. Having worked closely with the leaders of his company for a couple of years, he identifies a problem that he just has to solve. With the knowledge of how a firm works (end to end), he goes out and launches his own start-up. Hes going to make his mark in this world!
As a real hacker, youd probably want to be in the latter scenario, but there are a few realities one must face. Are there enough software vendors and funded start-ups in South Africa to make this possible? Do you have enough leeway to take a gap year of sorts to start a start-up of your own? Find Flow As a hacker, what you want to do is be in a situation where you find flow; by this, I mean you want to be working in a groove that fits your personality and strengths. I think this is possible, regardless of the scenario you find yourself in. If you know youre a hacker, youve got to keep hacking. David Byttow put it plainly: ABC Always Be Coding. Avoid at all costs any trappings related to money, status, power, and claimed shortcuts.
Stay close to your roots as a builder.

Youll agree with me that in the Silicon Cape, a lot of people have found their flow. Silicon Cape unfortunately cannot be taken to represent a trend in South Africa, because we effectively have both a first world and third world economy . The vast majority of our people grapple with basic needs, so if you have the rare opportunity of acquiring a sought after skill, why are you going to muck around earning less than you could be? The answer to this is because you saw someone else from your community do it, and they are thriving in all senses of the word! We need more role models to come out and share (with some tangible detail) on how they did it. Its starting to happen. A good example is the free events hosted by JoziHub where creators/builders/hackers meet to share ideas and experiences. A number of companies support these events with their products, encouraging people to build stuff. What is needed is more participation from hackers who have found their flow. Mark Essien (2013) wrote about the lack of sharing he observes in the Lagos tech scene, probably due to fear of competition. A stronger tech scene is good for everyone, so we need to start sharing. A stronger tech scene will result in more jobs, easier entry for the next guy, and it will put Africa on the technology map it will be good for all of us. In conclusion, what Im saying is, regardless of your career path, as a hacker, you need to keep hacking. You need to follow your passion. If youre not doing enough in your day job, there are many problems that can be solved with the odd side project. With the right level of networking, sharing, and effort, these side projects can grow into something profound, adding to the uplifting of our society in general. A lot more needs to be done to rope in hackers from disadvantaged backgrounds. If this can be done, we all will benefit from a surge in innovation.
Ntobeko Wakaba is the Founder and Hacker at Jalia Technologies, a South African ICT company. He has extensive experience in software development and architecture, ranging from consumer facing web applications to large scale, mission critical enterprise systems. He has worked in various industries including the Public Sector, Health Insurance, Transport, and Investment Banking. Ntobeko graduated from the University of Pretoria with a Masters degree in Information Technology.
Follow him on Twitter: @Ntobeko
Tech Startup Ecosystem and Investment Landscape Comparison - West and East Africa
MEGHAN SEMANCIK

It takes a village to raise a child.
-- African Proverb
Ive been in Nairobi, Kenya for the last 5 months of 2013 learning about the East African startup and investment landscape. It was interesting to compare the Tech Startup Ecosystem in Kenya to that of of Lagos, Nigeria where I had lived for nearly 14 months prior to arriving in Kenya. Like chalk and cheese, the Tech Startup Ecosystems and Investment Landscapes of the two countries are very different.
Local vs Continental The entrepreneurs I met and spent time with in Lagos seemed to be solely - understandably so - focused on their home market of Nigeria. Contrast this with the many entrepreneurs I encountered in Nairobi who were raising seed and Series A rounds to launch their product or service in Nigeria as well, and in many cases seemed to be nearly as focused on Nigeria as on the East African region in which they are physically located.
Also, with regards to Nairobi Technology Hubs and Accelerators, I found that although they are based in Kenya, they promote and leverage their Nigerian Entrepreneurs, Startups and activities to project an image of Nigeria focus/expertise even if their connections to Nigeria are in reality, quite limited, such as having one startup with one founding member being Nigerian.
I did not get the impression that there are many East African entrepreneurs working out of hubs in Nigeria like Co-Creation Hub (although things may have changed since I was last there in May 2013), but even if there were, I would imagine that they probably wouldnt receive extra promotional support, or additional attention due to their East African roots. Entrepreneurs and businesses in East Africa (as well as across the globe) are fascinated to an unparalleled degree by the economy, peoples, potential and mystique of Nigeria. This past spring, I asked some entrepreneurs at Cc-Hub if theyd heard of and/or were considering applying to any of the accelerators in Nairobi none said yes. My impression is that Nigerian Technology Entrepreneurs dont share a reciprocal level of fascination with East Africa in general.
Bosun Tijani, co-founder of Co-Creation Hub in Lagos, talks about their work at Open Up! - Image Credit: DFID UK/ Flickr CC by 2.0
Although Ive often heard Westerners state that Nairobi is a more livable city than Lagosreal estate is more affordable, power general more consistent, Wi-Fi is more reliable and affordable, etc. the investment climate for Seed and Series A non-impact investors is undeniably larger in Lagos.
Social Impact or Profit?

Theres a huge social impact scene in Kenya. For instance, the Growth Hub is an impact incubator and accelerator that supports early stage social enterprise entrepreneurs and startups specifically. There are numerous impact investment groups such as One Acre Fund and Acumen, and the large United Nations Employee and Alumni network, and decades-old legacy, in Nairobi, perhaps plays a role in promoting social impact agendas. In Nigeria there are social enterprise startups such as Wecyclers, but the impact scene is much smaller than Kenya, and the Global Development and Aid Industry plays a less prominent role in Lagos than in Nairobi.
Many innovative startups coming out of Cc-Hub receive small seed grants from Tony Elumulu Foundation, but it doesnt seem like many, if any, of these grants explicitly have social-impact-strings attached. Whether its cultural and/or due to a historical lack of American, European, etc. impact-oriented capital providers or Aid Organizations in Nigeria, a greater proportion of Nigerian entrepreneurs Ive met are purely focused on building profitable businesses rather than raising money contingent upon social impact benchmarks. Personally I feel that the successful implementation of either business model ultimately generates positive social returns, and I by no means intend to pass judgment upon, or rate either against, one another. Spending the last 18 months in Nigeria and Kenya (and a little time here and there in South Africa) has been an incredible experience one for which I feel blessed to have had, and look forward to continuing. Ill be spending most of Q1 2014 in Nigeria, and look forward to catching back up with the Technology scene and my Entrepreneur friends in Lagos.
Like chalk and cheese, the Tech Startup Ecosystems and Investment Landscapes of the two countries are very different.
Meghan Semancikis an investment analyst at Rio Partners, a Dubai-based investment firm focused on seed, early and growth stage investment opportunities in the mobile, e-commerce and media spaces. Prior to joining Rio Partners, Meghan worked for Spinlet in San Francisco, California and Lagos, Nigeria. Her career began in Lagos, Nigeria working for Rocket Internets e-commerce venture Sabunta (now Jumia) focusing on Product Management and Online Marketing. Meghan received a B.S. degree in Neuroscience from Duke University. Follow her on Twitter: @MegSemancik
Technology Ecosystem in South Africa

TEFO MOHAPI

When you shoot a zebra in the black stripe, the white dies too.
-- Unknown
I would imagine that the Information Technology Ecosystem in South Africa is not much different in other parts of the continent (Africa) as such, to present a uniquely South African IT Ecosystem I shall look at the subject of black representation in the IT Ecosystem in South Africa. Whos Who
The IT ecosystem in South Africa is split into different parts which can be structured and summarized as follows: Medium to Large Multinational IT companies (mostly European, Asian and North American) based in South Africa. South African and Non-South African IT products distributors. They are typically licensed by the multinationals and other local technology manufacturers or software development companies to distribute their products to South African resellers and in some cases to large corporate and government customers. Large South African (publicly listed and private) IT Systems Integration companies who are most times the chosen Premier partners / Value Added Resellers (VARs) of the Multinationals mentioned above; e.g. Dimension Data, Business Connexion, Datacentrix etc. Small to Medium IT Solutions / VAR / Resellers who mostly buy and resell Multinational IT companies products and add their services to offer their customers more value and a unique selling proposition. Technology and Internet Innovators and Startups, companies that develop their own technology and then sell it. This excludes new companies / startups that resell multinational technology as these can be classed as Resellers or VARs. Non Profit Organisations involved in technology innovation and training. These involve technology hubs, some government sponsored technology innovation centers and other organisations involved in technology training and assisting technology startups.
Government Departments and Parastatals involved directly in the development of policies for the IT sector and in some cases in the provision of IT services.
Now, looking at the ecosystem as described above I will attempt to answer the question of black representation in the sector. This is important considering South Africas Apartheid history as well as considering the countrys demographics. First, we need to define what representation means and as such I have decided to look at it from the following points of view:
Ownership Technical skills / Professionals / Engineers Representation (the guys who do the work)
Management Level representation, i.e. Chief Information Officers, Chief Technology Officers, IT Managers, etc.
Ownership Medium to Large Multinational Companies most are private companies and in the absence of more detailed information I assume the majority are foreign majority owned. Also, again in the absence of accurate data, anecdotal evidence suggests that they are among the largest Technology Companies in the country with regards to revenue. Distributors this is difficult to measure as you get some small technology products distributors, below the radar, and some large. So again, most being private, some are South African owned and some are not and you have some complying with general BEE codes, i.e. at minimum 25+1% ownership by Previously Disadvantaged Individuals (PDIs).
Although this might be said to address the black ownership question, some of the equity deals are not as straightforward as they are reported to be. Oft times this ownership is paper based or vest over time, i.e. some of the ownership is not realized until such time the BEE partners dividend payouts, profit generated, sales generated have paid for his / her share ownership equivalent by a certain deadline.
Such agreements are private and models can differ and there are exceptions where the BEE partner has paid for (in full or part) in cash. So on paper, in order to get a good BEE scorecard, the ownership of most distributors is at 25.1% Black ownership. Medium to Large System Integration Companies very similar situation in ownership as distributors above as far as black ownership is concerned. There are exceptions in cases where some have been majority black owned from inception. Or in some cases have been black owned through acquisition.
Small & Medium IT Resellers and VARs these are typically founder owned and managed and range in size from the micro (1 person) to medium sized. Black representation? Difficult to measure but one would imagine distributors and the vendors (multinationals) have a good idea of ownership of this sector of the IT ecosystem in South Africa as most are partners / resellers of their products and are registered with them. Also, theres a lot of churn at the lower end (micro). A typical scenario is a professional resigns and re-contracts to previous clients but in a few years company closes shop, gets acquired etc. Also, some are born as a result of a single opportunity identified based on personal relationships. At the lower end you get a lot of black owned companies, but they dont turn over a significant amount of money, typically in the 1st three years just enough to take care of the owners needs, tend to subcontract most if not all work. Technology and Internet Innovators and Startups - Given that there is always new Internet and Technology startups, it is difficult to measure participation based on the mentioned demographics. So, based on purely anecdotal evidence of startups who are getting attention both in the ecosystem and the media, it is interesting to note most startup activity (based on this criteria) geographically appears and can be perceived to be concentrated in the Western Cape, with a good number involved with the Silicon Cape Initiative. Information Technology Professionals in South Africa Theres a great representation of black people as far as IT professionals go. I dont have the exact or estimate numbers and at time of writing.
The best of these black IT professionals dont only work for IT companies (e.g. Multinationals, System Integrators) but are also scooped up by large corporates, government and parastatals and they end up in their IT departments. Typically, apart from their skills and experience, given South Africas Employment Equity guidelines and BEE guidelines, they come with the added bonus of improving a companys BEE Scorecard. This is sometimes sad, but true.
Theres also an interesting trend that is cyclical - albeit based on anecdotal evidence - currently the skills most black IT professionals are training in or getting certified in business analysis related, process analysis, data analysis / Business Intelligence, Business Process Re-engineering, IT Project Management and similar. The reasons why this is so could vary, it could be because of demand but theres also a bit of chasing the money which to a certain extent explains why there arent so many prominent black owned technology startups since the bulk of those who could be innovating are chasing the money. Nothing wrong with this, just an observation.
I mention chasing the money because before the current trend of the above mentioned skills, there was a great dea; of black professionals chasing the MCSE, Cisco Networking, SAP Consultant, basically brand / product specific ICT certifications because thats where it was perceived the money was. PLEASE NOTE: this is anecdotal, although I believe it is relatively accurate. So, as far as black professionals in IT go, they are there, majority are working in corporate and public sector South Africa. Management I separated representation of black skills in management from the technical skills portion because to get into IT Management you need to have had IT work experience and the situation is different here. Again, there is relatively good black representation although in this area you get a lot of pale males once again because to be CTO, CIO IT Manager you need experience. What you also find with the Black IT Managers is a relatively high employee turnover rate whereby because the pool of these managers is relatively small, they tend to be changing jobs regularly as they seek better opportunities. Challenges The biggest challenge in my view (opinion) is politics. Politics in the sense that despite BEEs best intentions, it is indirectly hampering technology innovation and entrepreneurship amongst black IT professionals as given the choice between a good secure salary and challenging themselves to use their skills to solve problems or be enterprising, they go with the job. Also, BEE hampers innovation indirectly amongst the resellers etc. in a sense that most of these companies adopt a checkbox BEE mentality whereby they ensure that they check all the correct BEE boxes on questionnaires and ensure that should a big corporate or government institution require to procure certain products / services they stand a better chance at getting that tender / contract. So instead of focusing on solving problems using technology and innovating, the focus is now on how do we win the tender / contract. Nothing new is created because from a political policy point of view there is no incentive to innovate or be enterprising.
Business Conexion is one of SAs largest ICT companies | BCX CEO Benjamin Mophatlane (Centre) & COO Matthew Blewett (Right) with Chris Gardner (Left). - Image Credit: BCX Blog
The other challenge especially for black IT professionals and white IT professionals is a racial perception one. Black professionals believe their progress is stifled by racist white IT managers whilst white IT professionals have a perception that black IT professionals in South Africa are of a poor quality and sub-standard. Neither deals with this perception challenge head-on, both groups huddle (anecdotal) in their own corners and continue to fuel these perceptions. Potential Solutions Provide incentives for technology entrepreneurship and innovation, this has to come from government. Forget BEE scorecards focused on ownership etc. but include incentives for innovation and new technology startups. Government being the largest IT buyer of hardware and software in South Africa it must be open to then buy MADE IN SOUTH AFRICA IT products. Not only provide incentives, but lead by example and buy the products as long as they are good and can compete with the best in the world.
Once the focus is shifted from ownership scorecards perhaps then many black startups will start to shift their focus from chasing tenders and contracts to developing products that solve problems and then selling those products.
As far as the challenges around professionals go and what needs to be done, no one can dictate what a private company must do beyond the guidelines that are already available around affirmative action and BBBEE. This then boils down to each individual having an open and re-conciliatory mind and willing to accommodate the other whilst not losing focus of business goals. Early training of youth in Science, Maths and Programming similar to what Non Profit Organisations such as PSTEM Foundation is key. This addresses the skills shortage and in turn addresses the issue of not enough in-country technology skills available for employment in the long term. The above is by no means a definitive guide of the Information Technology Ecosystem in South Africa but rather an attempt to put all the IT role players into a structure that represents an ecosystem for all observers and those actively involved in the ecosystem to understand. As such, comments, corrections and additions are welcome and encouraged as it will be updated periodically to reflect the changing ecosystem. Also, this is limited to Information Technology and excludes the Telecommunications part.
Government being the largest IT buyer of hardware and software in South Africa it must be open to then buy MADE IN SOUTH AFRICA IT products.
Tefo Mohapi is the Founder and Director at Mohapi & Co. (formerly known as Terrus InfoSys) a South African ICT Consulting company. He currently consults for Eskom as a Senior Business Advisor (Business Analyst) for their Group IT divisiion. He has over 10 years experience in the South African ICT industry having worked in various roles. An MBA candidate with Herriott Watt Universitys Edinburgh Business School. He also occassionally blogs for The Next Web and contributes to IT Web Africa. Follow him on Twitter: @TefoMohapi
Free and Open Source Software South Africa's Missed Opportunity?

MARK CLARKE

" There are many examples of companies and countries that have improved their competitiveness and efficiency by adopting open source strategies. The creation of skills through all levels is of fundamental importance to both companies and countries. "
-- Mark Shuttleworth
Google, Amazon, Facebook and Apple, these are the giants of the new economy era, they are amongst the most admired and hated (in some quarters) of coompanies. The ones every company wishes they could be like: Innovative, Nimble, Smart and Successful. Embracing Free & Open Source Software
Beside these enviable characteristics there is something else they all share in common, they have embraced free and open source software and methodologies as a key component of their success. Admittedly one can debate the degree of their commitment to the ideals and spirit of free and open source software versus their commitment to making money, and lots of it, but there can be little doubt that free and open source software is one of the ingredients that makes them successful. Given the ubiquity of these household names and the general admiration for their products, services and corporate cultures its a strange world where one finds oneself having to convince corporates and government policy makers and bureaucrats in South Africa of the benefits of free and open source software and the wisdom of adopting open source methodologies and ways of working. In South Africa, it is relatively fair to say that corporate and government policy are still entrenched in old-ways of thinking, trapped in a stagnant yet still financially beneficial ecosystems and unwilling to move from their proprietary enterprise software and infrastructure comfort zones. This cognitive dissonance, idolising the successful internet size companies of the 21st century, whilst at the same time resisting the adoption of a key element that has made them successful, is difficult to fathom. Mission statements, strategic reviews and assessments are all part of the daily life of corporate SA. MBAs and CIOs abound but one can only assume that groupthink has an iron grip and management in South Africa prefers to follow rather than lead.
Technology Education Some companies, such as First National Bank, have started to adopt open source, are already stealing a march on their competitors and are developing, or have developed, a reputation as being innovative and smart. The advent of cloud computing, another example of how open source and free software is driving the change in the world, and making money for companies smart enough to embrace it, is increasing the pressure for change. If Corporate SA wishes to remain competitive and be able to respond quickly to changes in their business environment the current approach to ICT will have to change too. But as South African companies adopted cloud computing in greater numbers, they are going to find it difficult to acquire resources with the required skills needed to manage their new infrastructure as few tertiary institutions equip their students with the necessary skills. Driven by corporate spend FET colleges and other tertiary institutions churn out candidates each year who are only skilled in a single or specific vendor's products and services. Their course designers sadly lacking the foresight to create qualifications that can equip students with skills they will need in the future . A focus on labour intensive, low skilled work by government, its low quality education system and a failure by industry to play a more active role in training and education is foolhardy. Of course if a more active role is taken, it would require the correct strategic visions to be successful. Whilst corporate South Africa and government policy makers and bureaucrats,prevaricate and turn a blind eye to the benefits of free and open source software the rest of Africa has no such qualms. West and East Africa have young well educated populations who have embraced open source and free software and their corporates have none of the reticence of South African companies when it comes to home grown solutions built on free software.
Their startup sectors are vibrant. Innovation hubs and entrepreneurial start-up incubators are springing up like green shoot after the first summer high-veld thunderstorms. The adoption of open source and government policy is creating a culture of learning and innovation which will spur their continued economic growth. I have no doubt we will soon see further technology success stories, such as the world-renowned Mpesa, coming from these regions.
It is not by chance that the governments of other members of the BRICS nations, are adopting pro- free and open source software policies. The pro-growth, pro-developmental benefits of such policies means greater influence over their own destinies and unlinks their economies from shifting economic power structures.
With the ongoing litany of revelations regarding the NSA activities by whistle blower Edwin Snowden, sovereignty and security is something that should make any government place the adoption of free and open source software high on its agenda. How can a nation's government and economy compete fairly in international trade negotiations or compete fairly for lucrative international contracts such as power stations, dams and telecoms rolls outs when one of the competing players has access to your plans and strategies? Only a nave person would think spying is for non-economic benefits only.
If the the current widespread use of closed sources routers and operating systems from vendors, under the influence of foreign government, with known back-door access, continues without even a pause for reflection by government departments and institutions; one can only guess why.
If national security issues are not enough to convince bureaucrats of the benefits of a pro-open source policy, maybe the economic benefits will. Government has the opportunity to build a sustainable technology industry that can export products and services to Africa and the world. A technology industry could also be built on top of proprietary vendor solutions and technology but this will leave decisions about the future direction of that industry in the hands of foreign vendors whose interests, local environment and conditions may differ widely from those of South Africa.
Its like trying to build a house on foundations that some-one else has set. Additionally there is the obvious economic benefit of building a local technology industry on open source, that significant amounts of money are not repatriated but circulate within the local economy.
Open source and free software has important implications for education too. Besides the costs saving to parents of students and the department of education, the freedom to hack on open source projects and code allows inquisitive minds to learn and understand more than is possible with closed source solutions which block any attempt to understand the internals of their products and services. On paper the South African government has a mandate to use and encourage the adoption of open source. But the commitment to is worth less than the paper the mandate was written on. Constantly government departments make an IT purchase decision or change policy is a way which is contradictory to this mandate. A recent such example was the Department of Basic Educations decision to drop Java , an open source language from schools and to standardise on Delphi instead,a closed source language and platform. An excuse is always found to abrogate the mandate and go with a propriety solution.
The most common excuse is that implementing a Open Source solution would be more costly than going with a propriety solution or that there is no local support for open source solutions.
Ubuntu Linux Linux for Human Beings - Image Credit: Massimo Barbieri / Flickr CC by 2.0
Besides the fact that arguments about total cost of ownership are likely to prove futile with either side backing up its claims an impress list of reports, it is simply untrue to claim there is no local support or skills base for open source products and services. What this argument really asserts is that there are no JSE enterprise size companies backed by even larger international vendors in South Africa but only small to medium sized business with limited capacity. This is simple not true as many of these same companies have open source and free software capabilities its just not in their interest to push them. But lets assume the argument is valid. Government economic policy supports the development of strategic sectors of the South African economy. Billions, up to 32 billion since 2000 according to reports, have been spent to support the local motor vehicle manufacturing capacity in South Africa.
Government would argue that the benefit gained outweighs the costs, so why not a similar undertaking to build the local IT industry? Where some see a problem others see a solution. We have high youth unemployment and a shortage of IT skills. A pro-open source industry policy which would favour the growth of small and medium sized business would seemingly address multiple issues at once. In one policy government could address youth unemployment, the skills shortage, boost small and medium business sector which is widely acknowledged as the employment and growth engine for any economy. An independent technology industry with a culture of innovation and creativity would be created and all government has to do is redirect it current spending. This lack of vision by South African industry and government, with it its apparent inability to plan for the strategic long-term requirements for the economy will mean the South African economy will continue to struggle for the foreseeable future.
A pro-open source industry policy which would favour the growth of small and medium sized business would seemingly address multiple issues at once..
Mark Clarke is a Java developer and Linux expert who works as a solutions engineer at Jumping Bean an open source integration company in Johannesburg. He has over 13 year experience leveraging open source and free software to build robust solutions. He is passionate about technology and creating a vibrant and innovative start-up industry and culture in Africa and is active in the community building user groups and organizing events to promote free and open source software.
Follow him on Twitter: @mxc4
The Rise of Peer Networks in the Innovation Ecosystem

KANYI MAQUBELA

A way forward is asked from those who are in front.
-- Zulu Proverb
Mitch Kapor, legendary software pioneer and prolific Silicon Valley angel investor, recently described his belief in impact investing in very simple terms: there are orders of magnitude more startups being founded today than ever before. The opportunity to invest in businesses which make the world better and return capital is greater because the pool is that much greater. He is completely right. There are more startups, and thus more mission-driven startups which are poised to change culture for the better. Our thesis at Collaborative Fund is predicated upon this same belief. We invest in creative entrepreneurs who want to change the world for the better using technology, and believe we will be an industry-leading firm as a result of it. A deep belief in the catalyzing power of a networked, peerpowered economy drives this thesis. I will describe some of the characteristics here.
Ubiquitous Internet A ubiquitous internet has resulted in global distribution channels available to entrepreneurs all and sundry, limited only by their imaginations and internet connectivity. Moore's Law has borne out. Amazon Web Services and other hosting of its kind has become a permanent fixture. And the explosion of online resources in business strategy, legal, and prototyping in mobile and have meant that entrepreneurs can do much more with much fewer resources than ever before. The social web has matured, and created networks of developers, designers, entrepreneurs, and investors around the world. As Andreessen Horowitz General Partner Balaji Srinivasan points out, these networks are not limited to physical geography. As a result, beyond the cost of entrepreneurship dramatically falling, the top ranks of innovators have unionized. Some work in formal guilds like YCombinator, 500 Startups, and Haxlr8r, and use these guilds to lead the market, create protections around deal terms, and force transparency across the industry. Others do so informally, and the industry becomes more democratic and accessible as a result.
As entrepreneurship becomes more accessible, so does angel investing. In the United States, there has been increased public market exposure to technology post 2008, and the M&A ecosystem is as active as it's ever been. As a result, scores of entrepreneurs and investors are entering the ecosystem every season. AngelList has been a catalyst to this trend, and will likely be a permanent fixture in creating a community for startups to be discovered, and for amateur investors to professionalize.
Venture Capital What does this mean for a venture investor? In short: it is more crowded, competitive, and flat than it has ever been. The best investors will have to be bold about inventing and reinventing themselves, and finding dealflow in the previously unlikely corners of the globe. It is inspiring to see younger funds creating new sources of free, highly relevant content for founders to attract opportunities. AngelList is iterating like a startup, finding more and more amazing ways of transparently connecting capital with companies. Paul Graham at YCombinator created the most powerful brand in the early stage ecosystem by inventing the MBA for startups. 500 Startups and Draper Fisher Jurvetson are reaching their arms across the world discovering and creating startup networks.
The list goes on. At Collaborative Fund, we have done our part to push the envelope in as many of these categories as possible, supporting crowdfunding, leading our content efforts with founders first in Fast Company and our video series, and microsites for the community. And there is another reason why venture capital is wise to innovate as quickly and as experimentally as it can: the management fee. Richard Arnold of Crowdflower estimated that management fees (including carried interest), account for up to 500 basis points of economic activity around the world. That is trillions of dollars every year going to money managers.
And for what? Their value is predicated upon information asymmetry. As an institution or individual, I let someone else manage my money because I believe they have access to better information than I do, and that their experience and network make them more capable of profitable investments than me. The former is surely no longer true. AngelList, Pitchbook, Mattermark, Crunchbase, Twitter, etc. have demonstrated that information asymptotes to perfect. So then it must be that a money managers experience and network make them more capable. But I recently heard from the managing director of a foundation that they are interested in getting closer to the network and that their analysts often read the same reports as the venture associates these days. In a mature social web, networks matter more, but any individual network matters less. Software is Eating the World When Marc Andreessen famously wrote about Why Software Eating The World, I have to imagine he realized private equity, and more broadly money management, was not going to be immune to this trend. If venture capitalists want to justify their 1.5-3% fees and 15-25% carry moving forward, they will all have to look more like these innovative firms, market leaders, or else they will get squeezed, leapfrogged, and ultimately die.
Random Hacks of Kindness at iHub in Nairobi, Kenya - Image Credit: Erik Hersman (whiteafrican) / Flickr CC by 2.0
For an entrepreneur across the continent of Africa today, the venture investor is more relevant than it has ever been. The key to the successful among these networks, and the bottom-up trends that accompany them, is that the best ones are not insular. Forbes contributor Michael Simmons describes University of Chicago Booth School of Business theory on network science. According to Professor Ron Burt, networks share clustering characteristics, whereby there is a lot of mutual friendship within the network, and as a result, ideas flow quickly within the network but very slowly outside the network. This approach creates blind spots. Those networks which show the greatest success are those which are cross-pollinated. They prominently feature brokers, who translate network information from one cluster to the next. For a young entrepreneur in Africa, they are natural brokers.
Most of the domestic markets on the continent are small, and so successful growth strategy is necessarily international, and often multilingual and multicultural. Venture capital tends to be concentrated outside the continent, though that is changing quickly as the entrepreneurship community continues to globalize and democratize, but it means that entrepreneurs must speak to the cultural landscapes of their users and of their investors.
Meanwhile, the networks grow stronger day by day. Access to best practices about startups is free on the web, and networks the likes of i-Hub, Silicon Cape, Startup Hub, and Apps 4 Africa serve as rich sources fo venture investors to discover talented entrepreneurs building for large markets. And finally, investors are taking notice.
As Kapor pointed out, driving a meaningful financial return in todays landscape is available to more investors than ever: there are so many more startups. But the market is competitive, and the business is changing in favor of peer networks, crowd-based funding solutions, and creative deal sourcing. As a result, the capital flows will be more distributed and diverse, and new ecosystems of startup activity will flourish as the Silicon Valley does, and likely outshine it, too.
Most of the domestic markets on the continent are small, and so successful growth strategy is necessarily international, and often multilingual and multicultural.
Kanyi Maqubela is a venture partner at Collaborative Fund, a seed venture capital fund for creative entrepreneurs who want to change the world. Founded in early 2011, Collaborative Fund has backed such startup companies as Kickstarter, Reddit, TaskRabbit, Lyft, BankSimple, and Skillshare. Collaborative Fund backs the shared future, and its investments have reflected a commitment to mission-driven technology. Before joining Collaborative Fund, Kanyi served as a founding executive at One Block Off the Grid, an online solar sales company that was acquired by Pure Energies Group. He has served as a consultant for IDEO, MINI, and GOOD Magazine, and started his career as an early employee at Doostang, an web-based career community acquired by Universum Global. Kanyi has been a contributor at the Atlantic, Huffington Post, and Fast Company. He is a mentor for Code2040, a non-profit organization that creates pathways to educational, professional, and entrepreneurial success in technology for Blacks and Latinos. He studied philosophy at Stanford University and was recipient of the 2003 University of North Carolina Morehead Scholarship. Kanyi hails from Johannesburg, South Africa, and lives in San Francisco with his family.
Follow him on Twitter: @km
Innovation, Intellectual Property and Law

MBUGUA NJIHIA

Ideas are worth a dime dozen, but people who put them into action are priceless.
-- African Proverb
I have had the opportunity to participate in many forums that have painted a clear picture of the issues that we must tackle within the Kenyan context and extrapolated to Africa at large if we are to grow into a dominant position in the technology space. It may currently enjoy buzzword status and take on many forms, but innovation is the foundation of our claiming a stake and anything that presents a bottleneck should and must be quickly addressed.
Innovation and the law Drawing from my interactions at Connected Kenya an annual summit that brings together government and private sector players to look at the challenges and opportunities of the citizen served, I had the opportunity to participate in a fireside chat with a healthy number of members of parliament present. A thought emerged on my first stumbling block to innovation; that of legal bottlenecks. Innovation lies in the rethinking of, or recreation of already existing elements to birth a product or service that addresses a pain point, whether apparent or revealed. Many times this will mean brining down walled gardens, challenging status quo and disruption of the normal. Our presently flogged poster child M-Pesa, happened to slip past the guard dogs of the traditional banking sector and scaled quickly to almost become untouchable as the ecosystem players, caught flat footed have been forced to play ball. Not every good idea will slip through the gate unnoticed and uninhibited. In this particular fireside chat was the issue of county insecurity, exacerbated by the lack of descent communication infrastructure and services. As deduced from feedback given by currently licensed players; the populations in the affected areas do not offer a juicy revenue proposition. In a perfect storm, the regulator would come down hard and fast on a provider that innovated to provide a solution; despite the fact that the asking amounts for say, a license are the very reason why the areas lack coverage. The areas leadership, as represented by the Members of Parliament has a mandate to fulfill to their people and have access to budgets that can be applied toward finding and deploying a solution with access to the August House (Kenyas Parliament) where they can marshal peer support to adapt legislation.
Director General of African Regional Intellectual Property Organisation, Fernando Dos Santos
Considering the political advantage is not available to all, which path would one follow? Would you succumb to the system and let a population suffer? Or innovate and fight out the legalities? I think companies should be in a position to invoke some amendment or other that protects an idea from premature death caused by an archaic or otherwise restrictive laws, where the benefits to the consumer or citizen - if thinking of government services would hold ground. Intellectual property and creation of exportable value At yet another forum held at the African Union in Addis Ababa, I took time to digest the Mo Ibrahim Governance Index and a host of other datasets that look at Africas current position and I feel validated in many ways on my call for the support and reinforcement of intellectual property institutions across Africa. As Kenya and many other African nations gun for knowledge based economies, the inherent economic value can only be fully and truly realized once we protect the intellectual property in what is a global sharing economy.
While we have runaway success by way of multinational brands, Africa doesnt have in my opinion, what we can boast of as truly global brands. With a burgeoning and very creative youthful population, the key to growing entrepreneurs who will deploy the next innovative technologies and create jobs at an international scale is to give our institutions both a bark and a bite. The global village equals global competition, which means it is not only the guy next door who could monetize entire concepts or borrow certain elements but a whole army of international idea trolls, scouting for the next big orphaned idea. There are currently 16 African states that are members of the African Regional Intellectual Property Organization, born out of the Lusaka Agreement and open to state members of the African Union. The rights covered are patents, industrial designs, utility models, copyright, traditional knowledge and trademarks. ARIPO is complementary to member states national industrial property systems and could therefore be said to be as strong as its weakest links; which to me are differentiated fee structures and non-standard compliance and enforcement. We should actively apply ourselves towards ensuring ARIPO meets its main objectives of harmonizing IP laws among member states, centrally handling grant and registration of IP rights and most importantly effective compliance and representation. A lot more awareness must be created on what is already in place and where we could improve especially so on the information and data exchange platform to seal loopholes and ensure homogeneity with similar systems successfully applied in other regions of the world. As we match education with labour markets and drive innovation in sectors that will propel growth in Africa, we must be of one mind and process when it comes to our creative capital and its protection even as we start thinking of legal bunkers that would allow for the proof of concept to be realized and assumptions tested; thereafter providing justification of whether to kill or let live innovative services or product lines.
We must be of one mind and process when it comes to our creative capital and its protection.
Mbugua Njihia is an Africa based entrepreneur with over 1o years in the web and mobile space having worked with all players in the ecosystem - individuals, small and medium sized enterprises, NGO's, mobile network operators, and government to deploy solutions on sms, ussd, voice, web and mobile applications. Founder and current CEO at Symbiotic, a leading mobile value added service provider in East Africa, Opportunity Scout at Gruppo Potente, a holding company where the focus is on Africa's high growth verticals - Technology | Telecoms | Media | Healthcare | Hospitality | Agriculture | Knowledge | Real Estate | Energy .
Given an option, he would spend every weekend on his mountain bike exploring new places and camping in the open.
Follow him on Twitter: @mbuguanjihia
Content, What Content?

JOHAN NEL

"What I witnessed with my eyes is greater than what I heard with my ears.
-- Igbo Proverb
Media executives love the word content. Its a rallying cry, an end and a means. However we tend to ignore the fact that there are two definitions to the word. Were quite familiar with content as a noun material held within a website, app or other medium. Content is king. User-generated content. Dynamic content. And so on.
Were much less familiar with content as an adjective satisfaction. Willingness to accept something as it is. In a state of peace. While we may not use this form of the word nearly as much, there is no hiding the fact that we are quite content as media executives. We are content to fill our sites with repurposed offline news (weve embraced a pdf-mentality). Were content to measure our success in eyeballs. Were content (actually, excited) to see incremental growth in digital ad sales. And in South Africa at least, were seemingly content to have our top ranking news site (in terms of traffic) sitting in 10th place behind international sites with little local insight.
Status Quo
The problem is that our contentedness with the status-quo will be our downfall. Im not the first person (and I certainly wont be the last) to say that the nature of news has changed, and that publishers need to evolve to meet the needs of the modern reader. But theres so much focus on the negative the downfall of media giants that I think that were losing sight of an incredible opportunity. As media executives, we have the capacity and tools needed to not just help our businesses thrive, but to redefine what news is, how its collected and consumed. Radio changed the world. TV changed it again. The internet is already doing it at a blinding pace, and I dont think anyone will disagree that we were caught off guard by the impact it would have on our traditional media businesses, or that weve been struggling to retake the reins ever since. Its now time to stop trying to catch up, to observe trends, to learn, and to help media consumers define and define the future. Its time to stop trying to bend a digital world to the will of our established business model, and instead to define how we can evolve to thrive in a new age. We must continuously learn, test and adapt to meet changing needs, and this process will begin when we renew our focus on the consumer, and how theyre finding the information they seek in the digital age (hint: it certainly isnt turning pages over coffee at breakfast anymore, or waiting for a trusted voice on the TV at 6 pm).
Hyper Local Content Image posted by Mimiboard user reporting a fire in Mitchells Plain - Image Credit: Mimiboard
Through the readers eyes Consider my news consumption and preferences. I live in a suburb of Cape Town in South Africa, and I collect my news from a variety of sources (as people do around the world).
I read the national newspapers at work, but rarely visit the websites many are pay-walled, and its largely a reproduction of offline articles (pdf-thinking), with a few more pictures and sometimes the ability to comment or share. Ive found that I go to the site because of the brand it is the source for South African news but more and more, Im visiting less and less. Ive come to realize that much of whats touted as news is only newsworthy because it appears on that publications website the brand makes it relevant, not the content.
Then theres broadcast... something funny happens whenever national TV or listen to radio (a major medium throughout Africa). It feels like Im reading the newspaper with video and sound. Its a more engaging experience for those reasons, but its still primarily a duplication of the morning newspaper content, with updates. This makes sense because the companies that own the national papers are media empires they own the major TV and radio stations too. Its certainly not hyper-local. Its designed to suit the needs of broad demographics, meaning content is anything but customized for my personal preferences. Furthermore, going to the websites of these broadcast channels reveals an entertainment/news mix that leans heavily towards promotion of entertainment, on-air personalities and shows. Its not a digital news source.
But lets step away from the national scene, and go local I often read my local newspaper. Its a weekly publication and very focused on whats happening in my community. I learn about local crime, events, infrastructure work and more, but the digital version isnt very robust. As a weekly publication, the paper is wary of scooping itself online updates are kept to a minimum out of fear that theyll result in lower offline sales, and because its a smaller organization with smaller budgets, it cant invest heavily in strong technical resources.
We can go even more micro (and I do on a daily basis, along with countless people worldwide) filling the local digital void are micro-publishers. Theyre local bloggers and startups that see a gap in the content provided by the big players and established sites. They sometimes have local sources (schools, police, sports organizations) but more often than not, they end up reproducing content from the same companies theyre trying to compete with in order to keep content on their site fresh.
Finally, if Im looking for the truly latest news, I dont go to a news site at all. I turn to social media. When protests were recently planned in Cape Town, I watched hash tags on Twitter for the latest developments. I visit multiple Facebook pages regularly for the latest on local arts and community events. Its an excellent source of information, but its also incredibly dispersed multiple sites, pages, hash tags and aggregators. I essentially have to build my own social media news outlet. As you can see, I live in a fractured world where Im left to play hide and seek with the news I want to consume (and my needs still arent really being met). I see this as a problem, but as I mentioned earlier, more-so as an opportunity. The nine most visited digital news resources in my country are international. Thats a significant gap that can be filled by a forward-thinking media executive. Yes, content is still the key. But we need to stop thinking about it as the content we want to publish and instead consider the content that our consumers want to receive. Its hyper-local, and technology isnt simply the delivery method, its the means of determining what to deliver.
Why cant a news site recognize who I am and serve me content based on my expressed interests and reading behavior?
News for demographics of One Like it or not, Facebook knows us. Were served ads and receive promoted content based on the things we say, like and do, where were located and what weve clicked. The result is a sometimes annoying, but effective approach thats being refined almost daily. If thats possible for Facebook, why isnt it possible for news? Why cant a news site recognize who I am and serve me content based on my expressed interests and reading behavior? Why cant it geo-locate me and serve relevant local content pulled from a variety of sources? Why cant it recognize my passion for cycling based on my avid reading of racing news and product reviews? Why cant it pull real-time traffic information for me based on my provided commute route? This is hyper-local news. Its based on the idea that I am, as a person, a demographic that can be served based on opt-in behavior and custom algorithms, and that collecting existing, preferred content in one place for easy consumption is in fact providing news. Im not just talking about geography. Despite living approximately 50 metres from me, my neighbor would have different content served to her based on her own behaviours and interests (though there would be common pieces of content between us).
This isnt a pipe dream. It is custom news content delivery made possible by the technology that the publishing sector is currently content to ignore.
You can likely tell that Ive spent some time thinking about this gap and the associated opportunity. Its because these are the exact problems that we encountered with Umuntu Media. We started out on a similar (Id argue more technically nimble) path as the big publishers. We wanted to be Africas source for local news, and began hiring staff writers around the continent to make it happen. But theres a reason the big guys elected not to go this way. Its unmanageable. Its too much too many people, and not enough margin to make it sustainable. So instead of bashing our heads against the wall and driving our company into the ground like so many of our predecessors, we set out to do something different. We recognized that there are millions of people already creating content online in these places and that all we had to do was engage them with user-friendly technology that allows them to share it in compelling ways. So we became a technology company (though thats just the beginning). The result? We had 70 journalists, and their work was generating 500,000 impressions per month on the traditional model. In our second year we made the pivot to technology provision, and down-sized to 5 content editors. In less than 8 months, were generating 68,000,000 impressions per month. We havent re-defined news, but weve discovered how hyper-local content can and does drive interest and engagement.
We certainly arent there yet, but were beginning to redefine what news content is, how its collected, delivered and consumed. So yes again content is key for the future of news. But it is not king, as its often shouted today. In the new, digital publishing world, the platform owner that understands what people want and how they engage is king, and will continue to be as long as he or she is never content.
Johan Nel is an experienced and senior media, technology and marketing executive. Johans experience as a founder and CEO of a Pan African technology startup and my extensive corporate career in the digital space helps fuel his love for the industry and ability to identify strategic gaps and execute.
He has held multiple roles throughout his career conceived, launched and nurtured his own award winning start-up, which is now active in 9 African countries. He has also been a steward of the commercial division of one of Africas leading publishers, managed strategies for one of the worlds most innovative digital service provision agencies, and currently also consults with a continental media giant on future digital projects.
Follow him on Twitter:@Johan12
Single Internet Space for Africa

VIKA MPISANE

The worlds of the elders do not lock all the doors; they leave the right door open.
-- Zambian Proverb
When the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) resolved in June 2008 at its Paris conference to open up the Internet and introduce new namespaces (what we call top level domains or TLDs), the global Internet and other industries took keen notice. ICANNs decision triggered furious moves and lobbying within the domain name industry. Not everyone supported its decision: for some, TLDs such as .com, .net and .org were still perfectly fine and there was no need for new namespaces. Yet for others, ICANNs decision presented a unique opportunity for promoting innovation, entrepreneurship, competition and choice.
For some, the opportunity to acquire new Internet namespaces allowed them to correct the wrongs of the past, and to properly position communities online in more innovative ways. If youre in Africa, this view tends to hold sway because from the inception of the Internet, the acquisition of valuable Internet domain names in generic TLDs such as .com and .net was dominated by the developed world. Africa was still far behind at the time to understand the value and importance of domain names.
With ICANN accepting applications for new TLDs in early 2012, the African Internet community did not want to be left behind. dotAfrica (.africa) was seen as a critical namespace that can help uniquely identify Africa online. Whats more clear was the emphasis on having the .africa domain name operated from Africa using African technology. This would help send a clear message to the rest of the global domain name industry: that Africa has now moved from being a consumer to an active player in the provision of critical domain name infrastructure on the same par as any best-of-class players. The entry of the African Union Commission (AUC) was an important driver behind the success of dotAfrica. The AUC provided leadership and helped avoid a repetition of having a unique African Internet identifier falling in the hands of non-African private companies. The AUC made it clear that the .africa operator should be an African entity with a suitable African technology. Hence the endorsement of ZA Central Registry (ZACR) by the AUC enjoys the greatest support of the African Internet community as the ZACR meets this important requirement.
The subsequent .africa application to ICANN no doubt enjoyed the important political support of most African governments. ZACR had no problem meeting ICANNs requirement of having at least 60% of African governments supporting the application. In fact, more than 40 African governments readily supported the AUC-endorsed ZACR application.
.africa general availability set for September 2014
But this is not the only benefit of the AUC-endorsed dotAfrica project: the commitments to use a substantial percentage of the .africa funds to build the African registrar community, to support African country code TLDs (ccTLDs) for example (Egypt), .ke (Kenya), .ng (Nigeria), .zm (Zambia), etc. and to drive the growth of African digital content industries remain a focal point. .africa is primed to leave a lasting legacy in the African Internet community because of these commitments. The fact ZACR the .africa operator is a not-for-profit company and will therefore run dotAfrica on a cost recovery basis means that all surplus funds will be invested in growing the African domain name industry. Accordingly, as 2014 dawns upon us, so do new unique web addresses dawn upon us. 2014 is the year we will start to see such web addresses as visit.africa, kilimanjaro.africa, and business.africa. 2014 is the year that Africa finally realizes its dream of a single namespace that all African businesses and people call really call our online home!
Vika Mpisane is the General Manager of the ZA Domain Name Authority (ZADNA), the country code Top Level Domain (ccTLD) Manager for South Africas domain - ZA. He has experience in policy development in areas such as trade and industry, economic policy, labour, education and ICT development.
He served in the Board of Directors (Excom) of Africa Top Level Domains (AfTLD) - the association of African ccTLDs between June 2006 and July 2012. During this time, he served as AfTLDs President/Chairman between April 2009 and July 2012.
He played an important role in founding an African Internet community-supported and African Union Commission-endorsed .africa (dotAfrica) application submitted to ICANN by the ZA Central Registry (UniForum SA). Vika since then become an exofficio member of the .africa Steering Committee comprised of the AUC and representatives from the African Internet community. He also helped secure the endorsement of the ZACR by local authorities to apply to ICANN for the right to establish and operate .capetown, .durban and .joburg gTLDs. In 2009, he was elected into the ICANN ccNSO council, and continues as the ccNSO councilor until 2015. In the council, he is involved in its ccNSO Meetings Program Working Group (WG) and Finance WG, amongst other structures.
His previous work experience includes working as a Public Sector Marketing Manager at Cortell Consulting (a business software consulting firm in South Africa), running his own consultancy, working as a Programmes Director of NEDLAC (National Economic Development & Labour Council) of SA, and working as a Transformation Officer at the University of KwaZulu-Natal (UKZN) in SA.
A former student activist, Vika graduated with a B.Proc degree in 1997 and LLB (Honours law degree) in 1998 from the University of KwaZulu-Natal. Follow him on Twitter: @VikaMpisane
ICTs Role in Strengthening Post-Conflict States - A Critical Review

AMIR KIYAEI

To engage in conflict, one does not bring a knife that cuts but a needle that sews.
-- African Proverb
Post-conflict environments are faced with significant challenges thus coordination and appropriate flow of information become paramount as the transformation to peace progresses. Successful use of ICTs can act as an enabler in such circumstances as well as supporting secondary roles such as nation building and reconciliation efforts. Strategic and optimal use of technology is critical, especially in resource constrained post-conflict scenarios.
However, there appears to be little emphasis on the use of ICTs for strengthening post-conflict states a situation that is nonetheless changing given the role of ICTs in everyday life. Overview
Post-conflict scenarios present a significant challenge for humanity. Decades of peace-building experience has shown that the development of strong and representative state institutions are key to ensuring that post-conflict scenarios do not revert back to war. The role of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) in this process has not yet matured, although at a granular level, the use of ICTs for administrative and economic objectives within post-conflict countries has been well researched. A knowledge gap exists however in utilisation of ICTs for political, judicial and security purposes as part of the peace building process.
The Peace building Process An immediate task in post-conflict scenarios is the development of an operational state, so called task of peace building. This approach places an emphasis on well-functioning and legitimate state institutions, thus reducing the risk of renewed fighting in post-conflict context. This is critical as scholars note that approximately 33% of post-conflict countries tend to revert back to war within a five-year period. During this critical phase, the adequate functioning of the key roles of the state become significant amongst them institutions of law and order (national police), organs of state related to decision-making (parliament) and mechanisms to foster economic recovery and developing of critical infrastructure. Successful peace building is accompanied by provision of services, while creating a platform for the population to communicate with the organs of power.
This for example can occur through direct communication between previous belligerents as well as govermental engagement with the populace creating the space for people to resolve conflicts nonviolently. Note the key emphasis above on strategy, institution building and coordination of all actors that are involved in the post-conflict scenario. This aims to minimise what are commonly cited as leading causes of failure in peace building, chiefly: Simplified analysis of a conflict; Poor planning and lack of coordination; A rush towards elections and democratisation;
Lack of local voices forming an input into the peace building process; and
Violent response as a means to impose peace in post-conflict scenarios.
To minimise risk of failure in peace building, practitioners are increasingly turning towards developing standardised models and methodologies to help accelerate the peace building process predetermining the criticality and priority of activities that should occur in such contexts.
Prioritisation in a Complex Environment No single model exists as to what is critical and should be prioritised in a post-conflict country, given the unique nature of human conflict in terms of political, historical and other circumstances that exist in a given warring context. Given this reality, peace building practitioners have developed a number of frameworks that seek to address this question.
In 2002, the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) in collaboration with the Association of the United States Army (AUSA), developed a framework that consisted of four pillars of peace building, namely security, justice and reconciliation, social and economic well-being as well as governance and participation. These are further defined as:
CSIS/AUSA Post Conflict Framework
Ghani, Lockhart and Carnhans research on peace building in 2005, emanating from the Afghanistan experience, yielded ten core functions of a state:
1. Legitimate monopoly on the means of violence;

2. Administrative control over its territory; 3. Management of public finances; 4. Investment in human capital, including education and skills development; 5. Delineation of citizenship rights and duties towards equality for all; 6. Provision of infrastructure services, including transportation, water and power;
7. Formation and protection of the market;

8. Management of the assets of the state, including environmental, mineral, cultural and other national assets; 9. Authority over international relations, including authority to enter into treaties and borrow from international market; 10. Effective rule of law. Ghani et als list of functions is shaped from a sovereignty perspective, aiming to create an independent and functioning state, while the CSIS/AUSA model is viewed towards reconstruction and development. Ammitzboll & Blair attempted in 2011 to consolidate these frameworks and concluded on five functional domains, namely: security, political, economic, administrative and judicial.
The security component includes legitimate monopoly over violence, reintegration of ex-combatants into the population and other security related activities. The function of constitution building and organising elections falls under the domain of political while public finances and market creation is housed within the economic domain. The administrative domain includes the core function of infrastructure and human capital management amongst others while lastly, the judicial function, considers the rule of law and reconciliation. In their framework, the authors augment their model with priorities, which is depicted below:
The generic model above highlights the priority of each core state function at a specific point in the peacebuilding process within the post-conflict context. Bearing in mind that each context is unique, the above are the necessary functions. If operational to a certain degree, these functions could significantly reduce the risk of a post-conflict nation returning to war.
The prioritised matrix of core functions, per figure 1 above, can be seen as the key business functions of a state. These functions can be enabled by ICTs and harmonised through appropriate frameworks in order to ensure alignment across organisational functions, ICTs and supporting policies and procedures. These however require orientation to national priorities, which in post-conflict contexts, tend to be a heavily contested by former belligerents as well as international agencies, governments and other actors.
ICTs and Peace building Given our increasingly technological and interconnected world, ICT permeates every facet of human life and thus also in contexts where a population has just undergone the trauma of conflict, and where the resumption of a normal life is paramount. The role that ICTs can play in this process has gradually emerged over the last decade, with the importance of ICTs in international development gaining traction since the initial World Summit on Information Society that was held in Geneva in 2003. This process occurred in parallel to the everincreasing use of ICTs in public administration and development of e-Governance as a mode of service delivery to the public. Parallel to political processes and reconstruction activities, fostering a common space for reconciliation as well as bi-directional government and citizen engagement becomes paramount and will enable nation building to occur in a more participatory way. A project in Liberia for example, successfully developed and deployed a video sharing unit that was used by that countrys Truth and Reconciliation Commission to further heal the nation.
ICTs are generally not prioritised as part of the peace building process. In post-conflict scenarios, the focus of the state tends to be on infrastructural projects,
The rise of mobile money on the African continent has enabled tens of millions of people access to banking services that were hitherto inaccessible to them. Mobile money can facilitate direct payments to civil servants, reducing corruption this has been successfully piloted in Afghanistan, with police officers regaining up to 30% of their salary that had been previously siphoned off. Similar levels of success were achieved in the Democratic Republic of Congo. The strategic role of ICTs in this context is however not well understood. ICTs are generally not prioritised as part of the peacebuilding process. In post-conflict scenarios, the focus of the state tends to be on infrastructural projects, with no framework to make any investment decision and track ICTrelated reconstruction and development process. Measuring the impact of ICTs in such context is also challenging, with no generally accepted monitoring and evaluation framework on the connection between ICT and peacebuilding in existence. There are additional difficulties faced in ICT programs that support peacebuilding, with issues such as: lack of clear mapping of responding stakeholder organizations roles and responsibilities[in addition] program development, project coordination, information sharing and ICT implementation are largely uncoordinated and non-standard activities. No agreed-upon architecture or plan is in place for postconflict nations ICT reconstruction. Supranational support for ICT planning is already in place on the African continent. The UNs Economic Commission for Africa developed an African centric ICT framework, entitled National Information and Communication Infrastructure (NICI). The framework focuses on the following: 1. Optimised use of ICTs in implementing national socio-economic agendas, provision of better and more efficient service delivery and poverty reduction; 2. Diversified economic activity that significantly incorporates the knowledge economy; 3. Established and stabilised legislative and regulatory frameworks; 4. Common and shared ICT infrastructure across the continent; and 5. The democratisation of the ICT policy process that incorporates all stakeholders. The five objectives above align well with the peace building frameworks explored earlier in this chapter.
These have however not been transformed for use in the post-conflict context. No consensus exists on reasons for this, although it may be due to inherent instability in post-conflict countries and difficulties in implementing the required ICTs in order to have wider ICT impact in nations emerging from war.
Research within academia, focused on the nexus of ICTs and peace building, is also nascent, with a majority of research focused at national & regional levels, with very little focus at the local level. In addition, most of the research on the African ICT and peace building research tends to be led and concluded on by non-Africans. Only 3% of publications in the past decade that focused on ICTs and peace building utilised a design science approach. Given the specific context of post conflict scenarios, it is paramount to undertake specific research to develop artefacts that are best suited to countries emerging from conflict. Research rooted in design science tend to have a higher likelihood, ceteris paribus, to lead to useful and practical outcomes for the intended end-users when compared to other research methods. Way Forward It is evident that the use of ICTs up to now have been focussed around business and administrative purposes. Within the peacebuilding domain, there is significant untapped potential for the role of ICT within the judicial, political and security processes, the specifics of which requires significant further research. An emerging positive trend is the publication of ICT related research in political journals and conferences, while the ICT world is becoming more cognisant of international politics and development. This will naturally bring together the two academic areas of interest and help bridge intellectual gaps in knowledge that will ultimately result in better theoretical and practical outcomes for both fields. Research that is focussed on theoretical and practical recommendations on planning, acquiring, developing and monitoring ICT projects in conflict stress zones would significantly boost the potential benefit that ICTs can bring to the peace building process. This is especially so as conflict stressed zones lack significant human planning and coordination capacity and require bootstrapped options to quickly emerge from their post-conflict contexts. Critically, there is the lack of research at local level as well as a perceived lack of involvement from researchers and practitioners from the post-conflict country or region. The two combined significantly hamper the local and historical human / cultural contexts that can impede the development of ICTs that will have a higher probability of success in the unique settings of post-conflict countries. More localised research, combined with higher levels of collaboration between Northern and Southern institutions, as well as South-South cooperation could significantly reduce the above noted issues.
Amir Kiyaei is the Director of IGD Group South Africa With over 10 years of experience in the field of IT Governance, Amir has provided consulting and auditing services to public and private sector clients across multiple industries. Amir has had client experience in Botswana, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Italy, Mexico, Nigeria, Singapore, South Africa, UK and USA. His main area of interest is the application of Information Technology to Development.
He holds a Bachelor degree in Information Systems and is currently reading for a Masters degree focused on ICTs and Peace building at the University of Cape Town. He is fluent in English and Farsi, and conversational in Afrikaans.
Follow him on Twitter: @AmirKiyaei
Reflection on Technology
JAY COUSINS

Many Hands Make Light Work
-- Haya Proverb
Africa's greatest assets are already developed. They are Technologies we once possessed in the West, but have forgotten how to use.
Technology is a tool applied to achieve a result. If we are wiling to apply this thinking to Virtual, and Physical, why not to our own intellectual and emotional states? Why are we constantly in pursuit of recreating ourselves poorly trying to create the perfect Humanity mechanically, fleeing ourselves in the process and failing to look at or admire our own capabilities. Man is technology, as is every creature, plant and thing that replicates itself on the planet. We are a form of technology used by Genes to continue their existence.
Technology is not always used consciously and it can unconsciously affect the user. We evolve together, we shape our tools and in turn they shape us and how we live. We started to neglect the development of the Self, in favour of the shaping of our environment our External Technologies. As our technology developed, we began to adapt ourselves to the Environments we created. We lost our fur, we shrank, our social and emotional behaviours shifted from Nomadic to Sedentary lifestyles. The tools with with we surrounded ourselves, affected our minds, our approaches and our metaphors of existence consider the language we use, how many of our terms relate to War, how many of our metaphors of society are based on Factories and industrialised processes.
Ideas and tools which were readily available to our imaginations, were more likely to grow, to evolve and to be adapted into our next point of mutual growth and development. Buses, Trains and Cars are based not on human dimensions, but on the width of 2 horses arses. This is due to Horse and Carriages being our base point of imagination at that point in history with respect to transport. Early computers likewise clearly derive their interfaces from our established relationships with typewriter and televisions. The inherited ideas of Externalised Technology, and it's forms was more prevalent in the design considerations of such objects than Human Considerations.
When I think of technology I think very broad, I would argue Language is a technology, ideas, systems, business structures, processes. All are Technologies. At some point we began to accept them as standards, we ceased to question their effectiveness with respect to how they really enhance our lives and allow us to be better humans capable of passing on our Genes. We are starting to fail in our own function. In Japan some youth are disinterested in Sex, they lack the desire to reproduce. Disconnected Many of us have forgotten how to repair, maintain and improve ourselves. We are dependant on and Disconnected by the Externalised Technologies we use to Sustain us, whether Physically, Mentally, Spiritually or Emotionally. On top of the hardware that we ourselves possess, we each have our own Operating Systems, comprised of different scripts and stories. Behaviours, and social adaptations. We have created layer upon layer of stories and relationships. The more scripts we wrote the more Bugs we added to our systems.
We seek to simplify our lives, yet we strive to achieve this by increasingly complex solutions.
We seek to use technology to reconnect us with each other, further disconnecting us in the process. Many of us are incapable of thinking outside of these frameworks. We approach a problem with a technological solution in mind. We think How can I solve this with an App? rather than How can I solve this?. We must address problems, starting with the problem, not with the solution. Just because an External Technology is mentally more available because it's sexy this year does not make it the Best Solution. Why do we externalise so many of the functions we naturally possess to technology? Why can we not perceive ourselves as the basis for our progress? We have a very bad story for ourselves, one where we perceive mankind as negative, needing to be controlled, to protect ourselves from the others. Our stories of the future are no better, Armageddon, Environmental Destruction, Economic Collapse, take your pick. These stories comprise elements of our Operating System. Scripts running in the background affecting our development and interaction with each other and the world around us. Many of these scripts are competing both internally on a Human Scale, and replicating like viruses on a Social Scale. Constantly interfering with one another, sometimes intentionally, but more often than not due to Bugs and Flaws, hereditary issues based on long dead and unnecessary social constructs.
Nubian Museum in Aswan, Egypt - Image Credit: Vyacheslav Argenberg / Flickr CC by 2.0
Talking to one another
Working in a community that still has a strong relationship with this Social Tool, has astonished me with it's effectiveness. It also helps to retain strong social bonds, strengthening the network and it's connections. Increasing it's resilience. Many functions run on this Platform, when used effectively. It is further enabled by Mobile Phones. Within a community where Talking to Each Other is applied, then the network spreads the knowledge and amplifies what is important, the stories below are 2 examples of this.
When I first arrived in the Nubian Village, I started to try making Pop Pop Boats - a small candle powered boat, made from recycled materials. After the first boat worked I showed some locals, and the kids at the School. 1 Week later, I was buying some more candles for a new boat. I set the motor down on the counter. The guy in the shop smiled, said Pop Pop and pulled out a diagram he'd drawn himself.
I drew no diagrams in my explanation (which was just a demonstration of the boat), this was the result of village conversations.
In a community with strong connections, exciting knowledge travels fast. Facebook shares could only dream of this level of connectivity and knowledge transfer. Based on a lightweight OS, with an Open API sharing effective technology solutions within the community requires little more than showing and inspiring.
In another instance as we were walking home, a Guy approached with his phone. On the other end was my friend. He told me, someone else had left some lightbulbs at my house for him. These houses were 100m apart. I realised I was witnessing the last 100m of a Networked Delivery System, the bulbs purchased in Aswan, transferred between friends, using houses as collection points, until they edged ever closer to the one who needed them. I'd previously wondered how I saw little work followed by bursts of energy and effectiveness.
Sharing where your going, what your doing, what you need, all conversations that make it easier for us to get done what needs to be done together. I'm not saying the above scenarios happen all over Africa, but I suspect they still do especially in areas where Digital Technology is not yet pervasive. In these areas there are challenges and genuine needs to be addressed. But there is a strong operating system that should not be ignored. It possesses Bugs like any other system, but it does not possess so many layers of Systemic Complexity and Technological Disconnection. It represents a space to explore how we can create meaningful systems, and how we can use Technological Development upon a firm foundation of community to advance society in a way that sustains us. The question for me is how can we learn from and replicate such behaviours in the West? Our culture is failing us because of the level of Disconnection and Dependancy we have created. We must listen, learn and translate. To explore how we can rebuild the base foundation of community required for a well functioning system.
Talking to one another, is admittedly a loose interpretation of Technology,

When we truly communicate on a Human scale, we are far more effective than any Externalised Technology is presently capable of. We have hacked text to convey emotions via the Emoticon ;), but this is not nearly as effective as Speech and Action in Person. Externalised Technology has it's uses, but we should first look to ourselves, and what resources a society/community has access to before reaching for the App, the Laser Cutter and the Smart Phone. We are capable of powerful adaptations and problem solving capabilities. We are the Ultimate Machine - we can reproduce ourselves, adapt our environment, create tools and other machines. We are the Ultimate Distributed technology, but we neglect to use ourselves effectively. Rural Africa, and other parts of the world where community is strong at the base has much to teach us. There are many social skills as well as a better understanding of how to engage with the Physical World, to shape it and use what is available effectively and without waste. We have much to learn. Let's take care not to destroy what functions already as we strive for the new. Let us take care not to let Shiny New Objects and concepts cloud our ability to see what is already here and working. Let us instead use these Human Scale foundations to introduce Externalised Technologies that are fit for purpose and environment. Don't copy the West, our bugs, our flaws and our failing social systems, instead lets work together to explore how we can build Technology that serves us on a Human scale, and uses what strengths we already possess to full effect.
This for me is the opportunity Africa represents. A chance to learn together, to exchange and to Mutually Develop means to sustain ourselves in a way which serves our Human needs and uses our Human capabilities. We all have the Technology already, we just have to use it effectively.
Jay Cousins works in Egypt with local communities to explore how they can to improve their lives and solve local and global challenges using locally available resources.
Follow him on Twitter: @JayCousins

Technology in Africa - 2014 Digest

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